Digital Health Coffee Time Briefing ☕

Your morning summary of digital health news, information and events to know about if you want to be “in the know”.

👇 News   

📢 Dr Mehmood Khan, CEO of the global non-profit Hevolution Foundation, set the stage for a paradigm shift in global ageing with the inauguration of the first-ever Global Healthspan Summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. As the largest event of its kind, the Global Healthspan Summit welcomed over 120 world-class speakers and nearly 2,000 delegates to co-create a healthier future for ageing societies worldwide. It brought together health leaders, pharmaceutical executives, policymakers, and geroscientists alongside former astronauts, AI experts, academics, and entrepreneurs, among other stakeholders. 

🧠 The Organisation for the Review of Care and Health Apps (ORCHA) has awarded Qwell, Kooth’s adult mental health support service, an exceptionally high assessment score of 90%. The assessment demonstrates Kooth’s commitment to safety, accessibility, person-centred support and evidence-based clinical outcomes. 

📃 The British Healthcare Trades Association (BHTA) has unveiled its vision for the future of the med tech and life sciences sector in a new manifesto launched yesterday in Parliament. The manifesto notes that a collaborative approach between industry and government can be delivered to unlock capacity in the NHS, hasten hospital discharge, and allow innovative products to reach patients quickly and easily. The manifesto calls on the Government to utilise the experience, skills, and expertise of medical equipment providers to shape the structure and regulatory framework of the health and social care system. Crucially, it identifies “untapped” potential for innovation that could be liberated by reforming procurement processes and renewing focus on value-based procurement principles. 

✔ CitiusTech, a leading provider of healthcare technology services, solutions, and platforms, has achieved the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Data and Analytics Competency. This recognition underscores CitiusTech’s deep domain expertise and success in helping healthcare and life sciences customers evaluate and use tools and best practices for collecting, storing, governing, analysing data at any scale, and transforming their data and analytics strategy on the cloud. 

🔎 3D virtual tours of 13 neonatal units across Kent, Surrey and Sussex have been launched, with the aim of providing families with a way to virtually ‘walk around’, learning more about layout and equipment as well as gaining insight into the neonatal transport service including a tour of the neonatal ambulance. Developed over the course of one year, the tours have been produced with the help of families, the Kent, Surrey and Sussex Parent Advisory Group, local neonatal staff, trust communication teams, Maternity and Neonatal Voices Partnership, Local Maternity and Neonatal Services and Kent, Surrey and Sussex Operational Delivery Network. 

❓ Did you know that? 

OpenAI’s GPT-4 correctly diagnosed 52.7% of complex challenge cases, compared to 36% of medical journal readers, and outperformed 99.98% of simulated human readers, according to a study published by the New England Journal of Medicine. 

📖 What we’re reading 

Axios – A year after launching, ChatGPT is already changing medicine – One year after OpenAI’s ChatGPT exploded onto the scene, the generative AI model is already upending health care — an industry not exactly known for its speedy adoption of tech — while accelerating questions about AI’s promises and limitations. By Tina Reed, author of Axios Vitals. 

🚨 This week’s events 

30 November 09:00-15:00 – Networks Exchange November: ICS Digital Priorities Unveiled – Shaping the Future of NHS